


sending home

by jonphaedrus



Category: Tales of Vesperia
Genre: Gen, Graphic Description
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-25
Updated: 2013-09-25
Packaged: 2017-12-27 14:56:49
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 581
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/980244
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jonphaedrus/pseuds/jonphaedrus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Always remember, Karol. No matter how bad a person is, if you kill them, you're killing the part of people that loved them. Everybody was loved by somebody, once upon a time. If you ever forget that, you're just as bad as he was."</p>
            </blockquote>





	sending home

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Chaoticblades](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=Chaoticblades).



When they split up to search for Yuri, Flynn and Estelle running hand in hand toward the water, Raven stayed frozen to his spot. Karol, halfway down a hallway with Judith and Rita, paused and turned around. He was frozen to the spot, staring into space, his expression closed off. 

"…Raven?" Karol asked, hesitant, after a moment, and the older man looked down at him, almost startled. He paused, and then sighed, his shoulder slumping.

"Hey, kid."

"Aren't you going to search for Yuri?"

"Yeah…just." He scrubbed his fingers through his hair, caught them on the tie that held it up. "I got something I gotta do." Karol stayed, watching him, even as Judith and Rita vanished around a curve in the hallway. "You wanna help me?"

Karol shrugged one shoulder. "Sure, okay."

Raven turned around, and Karol followed.

 

 

The top of Zaude was filled with wind, the remains of their fight blast marks on the stone, missed strikes left scrapes from blades on the ground, and the huge, half-toppled apatheia that had broken Alexei underneath it in only one strike. Raven walked to it slowly, and then stopped at the side that was already further up, and set one hand on the stone.

"Hey kid—mind helping me lift this thing?"

Karol paused, his mouth half-open to say something, but Raven's face was hidden, hung downward, and after a moment he came over and took out his axe, bending over to wedge the edge of the blade under the stone, and together they both pushed upward with Karol's blade as the lever, until there was a slow grinding noise and it lifted enough. Karol almost looked down, but Raven stepped in front of him.

He had taken off his coat, taken down his hair. "You aren't going to want to look," he said, quiet. "This ain't a sight any kid should ever hafta see. Close your eyes, Karol."

Karol closed his eyes. He missed Raven kneeling next to the location of impact, where there was nothing much but blood and shattered bone. He missed Raven pulling out the knife from his belt and pulling one of the few still-solid parts of Alexei toward him, slicing the tendons behind his elbow and breaking the remaining bone with a quiet, sickening crunch.

It came off easy, after that.

Raven wrapped it in his coat, and tucked in the tie from his hair, knotted the bundle tight with his sleeves, and stood. "Let it go," he said, quiet. Karol did. 

The stone slammed back down with a crunch, and Karol was opening his eyes.

Was it Raven or Schwann, with the hunched shoulders in front of him, holding a small purple bundle, blood all over his hands? Was it Raven or Schwann who opened his mouth and said, back turned— "Always remember, Karol. No matter how bad a person is, if you kill them, you're killing the part of people that loved them. Everybody was loved by somebody, once upon a time. If you ever forget that, you're just as bad as he was."

"Raven, your coat—"

"I can get a new one." He sighed. "You'll remember that, right?"

"I—yeah, of course, but what are you gonna do with that?"

"Bury it," Raven mumbled. "Because if nothing else, he deserved that much." 

Raven walked away without so much as another word.

He didn't show up in Dhangrest for another two weeks, and when he came back, he had a new coat.


End file.
